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Collection online

ship / model

Object type

Museum number

1894,1101.182

Description

Elaborately detailed terracotta model of merchant ship in Bichrome-style ware; hand-made with many applied details; large heavy hull with a rounded bottom with a highly detailed, raised poop-deck; large vertical shafts on each side of the poop-deck may be for oars for steering (an iron example of which was found in the original excavation, now lost); cross-beads span the hull, the central example of which frames a mast-socket; perforations along the length of the hull may have been drainage holes for an intermediary deck, or else oar holes; made of coarse red-brown clay, decorated black, red and (originally) yellow clay, much of which has faded since excavation; lines of black dots on the cross beams; parts of the model are damaged and cracked, and some of the original details seem to have disappeared, perhaps made of perishable materials.

Production place

Findspot

Materials

Ware

Technique

Dimensions

Length: 31 centimetres

Width: 9 centimetres (max. amidship)

Height: 7 centimetres (max. amidship)

Height: 3.5 centimetres (stern above gunwale)

Curator's comments

See also: A. Hermary, Figurines en terre cuite des fouilles anglaises d'Amathonte (1893-1894), CCEC 26 (1996/2), pp. 13ff which discusses in particular the terracottas from Tomb 83. The model is difficult to date on form alone, but probably belongs to the sixth century based on associated objects.